


I Win.

by Kitty_Kinneas



Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-04-21
Updated: 2014-04-21
Packaged: 2018-01-20 05:43:21
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,476
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1498798
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kitty_Kinneas/pseuds/Kitty_Kinneas
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>At the summer faire in Ealdor, Arthur tries his hand at what he terms a 'peasant' game. When he isn't pleased with the outcome, he makes sure everyone knows it's just not really the way things are.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I Win.

“It's so...”

 

Oh, here it came. He'd been waiting for it.

 

“So...”

 

The arrogant bastard had _wanted_ to come, but Merlin had known it would be a bad idea.

 

“So...”

 

He'd held his tongue for the two hours they'd thus far been at the faire, but the young sorcerer had known it couldn't last, because the Pendragon Prince did so love the sound of his own pontification.

 

“So... _peasanty_.”

 

“Peasanty?” Merlin echoed. “Is that even-”

 

“Yes, peasanty,” Arthur agreed, nodding and gesturing with the half-eaten apple in his hand.

 

Merlin sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose briefly. He had asked for a couple of days' time to come home for the summer faire without ever expecting Arthur to even let him go, never mind wanting to come  _with_ him.

 

Of course, the whole bloody town was abuzz with the fact that Arthur Pendragon was at their humble village faire, but they didn't have to put up with the prat when they were trying to enjoy themselves.

 

“Well...” Merlin said slowly. “We _are_ peasants.”

 

“Yes, you are,” Arthur said, hooking his arm around Merlin's neck and tugging him close, rubbing his knuckles hard against the black hair.  
  
“Arthur!” Merlin complained. “Ar _thur_ , cut it out!”

 

The blonde Prince smiled and gave Merlin a companionable shove in the shoulder that sent him stumbling three steps leftwards. He muttered to himself and slumped along in his master's wake, hating that Arthur was enjoying himself and he was not.

 

Arthur's attention was quite suddenly taken by something he saw, and he veered off to one side. Merlin rolled his eyes and followed after, jerking his hand through his hair.

 

The prince stood on the edge of a roped-off field. The grass had been cut short in places – very short. Long, narrow patches with angles and curves in strange places. Hills had been built up in some and dips dug in others. Villagers held strangely shaped mallets with long sticks and very slender heads, and they used the sides of these heads to hit small balls along the shortened grass.

 

“Merlin, what's that?” Arthur pointed.

 

“What? Oh. Haven't you played before? The ball goes at one end of the green – that's the short grass – and you use the club to hit it, and try to get it into the hole at the other end. The less hits you have, the better.”

 

“Intriguing. I believe I will play your peasant game,” Arthur declared and walked right through the middle of the course, knocking people's balls and disturbing some of the hazards. Merlin scurried along behind apologising and righting things where he could.

 

Arthur, of course, demanded that the course be cleared for him and then, out of nowhere;

 

“You will play with me, Merlin.”

 

Merlin had been compensating the man running the game for the business he would miss out on while Arthur took up his whole course, and he dropped the handful of gold when Arthur spoke.

 

“What?” he said, crouching to pick up the gold.

 

“You will play with me. I need some competition... not that you are likely to provide much.”

 

“I'm good at this game,” Merlin said uncertainly. “Are you sure you want to play against me?”

 

“Are you suggesting you will be _better_ than me?” Arthur said mockingly. “Please.”

 

“You haven't played before,” Merlin said. “And you're supposed to hold the other end of the club.”

 

Arthur glanced at the club in his hand and scowled when Merlin smirked. A flick of his wrist flipped the club over and he put it over his shoulder.  
  
“Come on, Merlin. You must be champing at the bit for the chance to be better than me at _something_ ,” Arthur taunted, turning towards the first hole. “Not that you will be.”

 

Merlin muttered to himself. He took up a club and two balls – because of course Arthur hadn't gotten his own, and followed after the Prince. No way was he going to  _let_ Arthur win, if that was what the arrogant bastard thought...

 

“Show me how it's done then, Merlin,” Arthur said, that mocking tone still lacing his voice.

 

Merlin gave Arthur his ball and put his own on the little indent at the start of the hole. He fell easily into the right stance and glanced along the length of the simple first hole. Of course the ball dropped in on the first hit and he couldn't help a little smirk of triumph.

 

“Oh, so it's that easy,” said Arthur, placing his ball as Merlin had done. He drew back the club.

 

“Arthur, you're going to hit it-”

 

The club made such solid connection with the ball that people playing a dicing game off the field looked up. The ball went sailing over three different holes and landed in the long grass off the course.

 

“...too hard...” Merlin finished.

 

Arthur scowled and held out his hand for Merlin's ball. The sorcerer put it there, then trudged off to get the one the Prince had sent flying. The blonde managed to restrain himself and get the ball close to the hole without it flying off, and then he sunk it for three.

 

“Not a word, Merlin,” Arthur growled when he returned. He said nothing, but smirked a little.

 

They moved on to the next hole, which was placed in the side of a gentle slope at the opposite end of the green to the tee. Merlin went first again. His first shot brought the ball up just below the hole, and his second sunk it, then he turned to watch Arthur.

 

“Sire, that's still too-” He ducked and the ball went whizzing over his head. “-hard.”

 

“I think my club is too long,” Arthur decided, and he sent a boy to get a slightly shorter one, before he again took Merlin's ball and sent the sorcerer off to pick up the one that had flown across the field.

 

By the time Merlin returned, Arthur had had five more shorts and was growing more frustrated by the minute, as the ball kept rolling up beside the hole, over it, and coming down the other side. Merlin stared. On the next shot, he gave a flick of his finger and murmured a word of power and the ball changed course slightly so that it actually dropped in the hole.  
  
“Good shot, Sire,” he said blandly.

 

Arthur shot a glare at him that would have lit his hair afire if the Prince was the one with magic. He smiled hopefully and Arthur turned on his heel and stalked on to the next hole.

 

No matter how much Merlin tried to tell him, Arthur continued to hit the ball too hard on the first stroke every time. When they eventually reached the ninth hole (eventually because Arthur took five or more shots on every hole preceding) Merlin was completely exhausted from running after the Prince's errant first tries and from stroking his floundering ego with complete lies about the direction of the wind and the way the grass was bending.

 

“Sire,” he said when he totalled up the scores on the first half of the holes. “Sire, I'm winning.”

 

“I'll soon rectify that,” Arthur said blithely.

 

“I'm winning,” the sorcerer added with malicious pleasure. “By twenty shots.”

 

“Shut up, Merlin. It's a stupid peasant game anyway.”

 

“It's a fantastic game.”

 

“Merlin... _shut up_.”

 

Merlin did for a few moments, then he couldn't help but wonder;  
  
“Does that mean you're admitting defeat?”

 

Arthur's blue-grey eyes narrowed and Merlin smiled innocently at him.  
  
“To you?” the Prince said with a disgusted curl of his aristocratic features. “You're joking, surely. I will beat you.”

 

“Should we start the score over again, then, Sire?” Merlin suggested innocently, hiding his grin. “And see who's best of the last nine?”

 

“Well, I could beat you either way, but if it _pleases_ you, Merlin,” Arthur said with a sarcastic twist.

 

Merlin bit his tongue on the pointing out of the fact that it would be nearly impossible to beat him from twenty shots down, and instead said;  
  
“As you say, sire.”

 

The twelfth hole had Merlin in absolute fits of laughter.

 

It was a simple enough hole, straight and too the point, the tee at one end and the hole at the other. But in the very middle was a log carved into a square block. There was a gap either side of it, and a tunnel through the middle of it.

 

Arthur whacked his ball and it miraculously stayed on the ground, but it missed every path past the block and instead smacked into it, bounced back, and cannoned into Arthur's toe. The Prince swore and hopped in pain and Merlin couldn't contain himself. He laughed so helplessly he had to bend over, hands on his knees.

 

The Prince's eyes were dangerously narrowed, but Merlin didn't notice – he was laughing too hard.

 

“This isn't a real sport anyway!” Arthur snapped when Merlin had calmed a little. “ _Hunting_ is a real sport. A _man's_ sport.”

 

“I think it's great,” Merlin said, grinning broadly.

 

“No. It's stupid.”  
  
“You're only saying that because I'm beating you!” Merlin cried.

 

“At a stupid peasant sport. A girl's sport,” Arthur said.

 

“That you can't play.”  
  
“Oh, shut up, Merlin.”

 

“So, do I win?”

 

“We haven't finished yet,” Arthur said doggedly. He would not give up on anything.

 

“At least you know I'm not losing on purpose,” Merlin said snakily, harking back to the time Arthur had given himself a false name in order to compete in the jousting fairly.

 

Arthur cuffed him around the head, but he was too amused to be much bothered by it. The Prince stalked off to the next hole and Merlin smirked his way after him.

 

Of course, the extra six holes made no difference, except that Arthur ended up even further behind. He was a brooding cloud by the time his ball finally dropped into the hole on the eighteenth. And Merlin's self-satisfaction probably wasn't helping, but it was absolutely  _delicious_ to have beaten the Prince Pendragon at something.

 

“Stop looking so pleased with yourself and find me something to eat!” Arthur snarled.

 

“Oh, Mother is making dinner,” Merlin said, voice still amused. “She's excited to have you there again.”

 

Arthur gave a curt nod and marched off.

 

\- - - - - - -

 

It was dark, way beyond full moonrise and into its setting again.

 

Arthur had, as a matter of course taken Hunith's room, as she had vacated to a cousin's house for that reason. So Merlin slept in his own room.

 

But Arthur wasn't sleeping. He stood in the doorway of Merlin's room, arms folded across his chest and shoulder leaning against the lintel. The servant lay flat out on his stomach, covers all but pushed off in the heat of the summer night.

 

And he was naked.

 

Arthur's eyes ran down the curve of Merlin's spine, picked out by silvered moonlight and the single candle the idiot had left burning. The grey-blue gaze settled lower and he smirked, tongue running along full lower lip. A slow blink broke his fascination and the Prince looked back up to Merlin's sleeping face. He would never tell the servant, but God, Arthur found those thick lashes and the eyes they currently veiled beautiful, especially when Merlin was staring up at him, whimpering his name.

 

The smirk fell away.

 

Merlin had gone to bed all too pleased with himself, full of far too much self-importance than was seemly for a servant, and all because he felt this alleged (for Arthur was still certain the game had been rigged somehow) victory afforded him some measure of... of...  _betterness_ .

 

Well, Arthur would put him back in his place, and no mistake.

 

The Prince tipped his head and considered. Stripping out of his sleeping pants would be more efficient, but he was not unaware of the extra control being even partially clothed gave him over someone completely naked.

 

Arthur decided upon efficiency and shimmied out of them, then went over. He twitched the blankets the rest of the way off and crawled up Merlin's form, holding himself up off the sleeping servant for a few moments with hands fisted against the pillow to either side of Merlin's dark head. Merlin murmured and shifted a little and Arthur smiled affectionately, then lowered his hips against the other man's behind.

 

Those inordinately thick lashes fluttered and opened to slits, Merlin unconsciously lifting his body a little.

 

“...thur...?” he murmured.

 

“Who else?” was the cocky reply, and Arthur's hips gave a slow grind against the servant's backside.

 

“No one,” Merlin hissed, nuzzling at the pillow. “Mmm...”

 

“There better not be,” the Prince said possessively, and that made Merlin shudder.

 

“When would I have time?” Merlin said wryly.

 

“Insolence,” Arthur accused. “I will give you more work to do, if you like.”

 

“No, thanks,” was the quick reply, and the sorcerer shifted against him.

 

“Do you think you work hard enough?” Arthur wondered, kissing at the curve of a shoulder and neck.

 

“Yes,” Merlin said, nuzzling against his own folded arms.

 

“Debatable,” was the Prince's reply. He dipped his head lower, kissing and licking down the curve of Merlin's spine, all the way to the small of his back. He spent some time there, knowing well how sensitive a spot it was, and his slow licks, light nips and damp kisses soon had the young servant whimpering and mewling.

 

“Arthur,” he gasped when the Prince's attentions wandered lower yet. “The walls...” He gasped, because those warrior's hands had come to rest against his behind and Arthur's tongue swept, teasingly quick against his entrance.

 

“Thin, are they?” Arthur wondered, almost derisive.

 

“V-Very...”

 

“Good,” the Prince purred. “This village needs to know who really wins...”

 

Merlin whined, a long, thin keening sound as Arthur's mouth and tongue both dipped to tease him.

 

“But...” he gasped. “But... I thought you wanted to be sure... we... stay a secret...”

 

“Who will they tell?” Arthur wondered arrogantly, and then; “Who would believe them if they did?”

 

Merlin said nothing to that, because Arthur was right, of course, and besides who was he to deny Arthur Pendragon?

 

“Oh...” he said instead, because Arthur's tongue had delved as deep as it could, making his whole body undulate from shoulders to toes. The Prince gave an altogether pleased chuckle, withdrew the appendage and thrust it deep again. Merlin tried his best to bite back the cry that fought its way up his throat. He had to bite a mouthful of the pillow to manage it. Again Arthur did it, and again until Merlin cried; “Arthur!”

 

Arthur smirked and wound an arm about his hips, lifting them bodily. Merlin didn't need telling to get his knees under them. Now the pleasure came from two points, the Prince's hand about his length and that merciless tongue, and the fact that he needed to stay quiet to preserve his dignity in his hometown began to slip his mind.

 

He pressed his forehead into the pillow, concentrating on his breathing and trying to keep it steady, but it stuttered and skipped I a way he knew infinitely pleased his golden lover. He moaned, long and low and Arthur said roughly;  
  
“You can do better than that...”

 

Two fingers found and rubbed at the very tip of his length and he gave a bitten off sob of pleasure, hands fisting and legs flexing.

 

“You know how I love the sounds you make, Merlin...” Arthur breathed across his tailbone, dipping his head again.

 

“Arthur...” Merlin whispered, then louder; “Arthur!” And he cried out, hips bucking a little, but Arthur held him still.

 

Quite suddenly, the Prince dragged his tongue up Merlin's spine, sinking his teeth into the sorcerer's shoulder and Merlin yelped, then moaned throatily.

 

“You,” Arthur growled in his ear, shaping himself to the curve of Merlin's body. “Will never be better than me.”

 

Merlin sucked in a breath.

 

“Except at a silly peasant's game,” he replied, soft but daring.

 

Arthur almost snarled and his hand tightened around Merlin's length, making him hiss softly. His other hand buried itself in the jet black hair and forced the sorcerer's head back, leaning forward to suck at his throat.

 

“'Ware, Merlin,” he warned. “You shouldn't tease a lion.”

 

Merlin laughed softly.

 

“You would never kill me,” he said with surety. “You could hardly be bothered breaking in a new servant...”

 

“He would be a damn sight better than you,” Arthur growled, biting at Merlin's throat, which only served to make him murmur in a pleased manner.

 

“Arthur,” Merlin sighed in a way he knew Arthur particularly liked. Sure enough, a minute shiver ran through the Prince.

 

He shifted his weight a little, pressing his length between the cheeks of Merlin's behind and rocking, slow but hard, against him.

 

“Oh...” Merlin sighed, pulling a little against the grip on his hair. “Oooh...” He made to rock back against Arthur, but the hand around his length tightened a little more, holding him still.

 

“Before I am done,” came the Princely growl in his ear. “The whole village will hear you beg for me...”

 

The words themselves sent a jolt of heat straight to Merlin's belly and he made a soft, submissive sound from the back of his throat.

 

Arthur's hand dropped from between Merlin's legs to support his weight against the bed instead, allowing him to press more firmly still against his lover's behind. He himself groaned in Merlin's ear and Merlin moaned at the rough heat that rubbed over and again.

 

Arthur was ridiculously controlled, even (or perhaps especially) in these moments, and Merlin would hate him for it if he didn't love it so much. He increased his pace a little and let go of Merlin's hair, instead curling his hand around the sorcerer's neck. Merlin couldn't help it. He spread his legs a little more and arched up against the Prince, biting back yet another cry. Arthur saw it and growled softly.

 

“Remember, Merlin...” he purred. “I could easily take my own pleasure this way... I could easily give myself release this way, while it only teases you to insanity...”

 

Merlin whimpered. He did remember, because the Prince had done so before.

 

“No...” he whispered huskily, swallowing against Arthur's fingers.

 

“No?” Arthur echoed, his hips quickening a little more. “Are you giving me orders?”

 

“No!” Merlin was hasty to cry. “No, My Prince.”

 

“Then... if it was a request, how should you word it?”

 

“P-please...” The response was instant and didn't falter. “Please... don't do that...”

 

“Perhaps,” Arthur said, promising nothing. “But for the moment, I think we should put that mouth to better use.”  
  
“Yesss...” Merlin hissed eagerly, hips arching again. “Please.”

 

Arthur's chuckle came from the back of his throat and he straightened, guiding Merlin around on all fours with the hand against his neck.

 

He didn't have to say a word. Merlin dragged his tongue instantly across the tip of his length, and then took the head between his lips, the smallest of whimpers on his tongue before the Prince's length was on it instead.

 

Arthur rubbed his hand encouragingly between Merlin's shoulder blades, lowering himself into a more relaxed kneel, which served to lower the sorcerer's upper body as well, leaving his hips deliciously lifted. Arthur licked his lower lip.

 

“You _are_ beautiful,” Arthur breathed and the rare compliment had Merlin taking the Prince deeper, wanting to please him. His tongue and lips moved with the skill Arthur had taught him, and one hand came to the dip of the Prince's waist into his hip.

 

Arthur let his hips move lazily, but shallowly, having no intention of ever really hurting Merlin. The sorcerer took it in his stride, riding the movements easily, and using them to increase the pleasure he was giving. The Prince's leaned back a little, his blue grey gaze drifting from the muscle flexing up and down Merlin's back to the attractive picture of the man's mouth wrapped around him.

 

He groaned.

 

Soon, Merlin had clearly begun to regain control of his senses and reactions so, with a smirk, Arthur slid his hand down and nudged his fingers at Merlin's mouth. The sorcerer took the hint and left off his lover's length to pay the same decadent attention to his fingers instead. Once satisfied, Arthur took his hand away and Merlin knew without needing to be told to return to his previous task.

 

He was rewarded with another groan, and Arthur slid the heel of his hand up the curved spine to dip his fingers against Merlin's entrance, rubbing it hard and watching with delight the squirm it caused. Then he pressed both inside at once and Merlin moaned around his length, causing yet another groan in return.

 

Arthur was not gentle. This wasn't about gentle. He thrust his fingers deep and sure and fast and Merlin's moaning increased in volume, even muffled as it was. The Prince's hips began to rock again.

 

“That's my Merlin,” Arthur cooed, merciless.

 

Merlin did not possess Arthur's control, but he had long since learned to deal with the pleasure the Prince gave him without clamping his teeth down, and so he continued in his own work, even as his mind began to drown in the sensations plaguing his body.

 

He didn't mind when Arthur was harsh with him. Quite the opposite. There was something in him that thrilled at it. His hips jerked, but Arthur spread what was left of his hand outside of Merlin against his flesh and pressed down, holding him still with muscle alone.

 

“You're mine,” he growled, sounding like nothing so much as the lion he had previously mentioned.

 

Merlin gave an agreeable whimper and then a throaty cry as Arthur's fingers increased their pace. Yet, deep as they drove, Merlin knew there was better. But, trapped as he was by Arthur's hand and cock and body, he couldn't get his mouth free to ask for it.

 

“You're _mine_ ,” Arthur growled again, and again Merlin did his best to answer in the affirmative, squirming in the hopes his Prince would realise what he wanted.

 

Of course Arthur  _realised_ . What sort of a lover would he be if he didn't? But Merlin's squirming desperation was a pleasure all its own and so, instead of relenting and giving him what he wanted, he continued to tease, dragging his tongue across that oh-so-sensitive small of his lover's back while his fingers thrust and his hips rocked.

 

Eventually, of course, even the Prince of Camelot couldn't stand any more teasing and so he slid his fingers free, to a dejected whine from that pleasurable mouth against him. He smirked and rested back on his hands again to watch Merlin a moment a longer, lifting his head a little and looking down his nose when Merlin's blue, blue eyes looked pleadingly up at him.

 

“Do you want something?” he wondered with infuriating calm.

 

Merlin took this as the permission that it was and released Arthur's length, giving one last, lingering lick to the tip.

 

“Yes,” he answered, licking his lips and leaning up for a kiss. “Yes.”

 

“What do you want?” Arthur breathed across his mouth.

 

“A kiss,” Merlin whispered.

 

The Prince's smirk turned a little softer and he kissed Merlin, tongue as sure and demanding as his fingers had been.

 

“And?” he wondered when they drew apart.

 

Merlin didn't answer. Instead he withdrew and turned his back on Arthur again. Slowly, he lowered himself to all fours, and then his shoulders lower still. He wrapped his arms around a pillow and rested his ear on it, so he could look back at Arthur. Finally, he arched his back downwards, angling his hips up towards his lover.

 

“Put me in my place,” he whispered.

 

Arthur purred and fit his own hips to the curve of Merlin's behind, fisted hands resting against the pillows either side of the lowered shoulders.

 

There was no questioning who won now.

 

“Say please,” Arthur whispered, licking the shell of Merlin's ear.

 

“Please...” Merlin murmured.

 

“Louder.”

 

“Please.” It was at a speaking volume this time and Arthur reached between them to position himself, pressing, but not entering.

 

“Louder, Merlin.”

 

“Please!” It filled the room but probably went no further.

 

Arthur, with iron control, pressed only the head of his length within his lover, whose eagerness set his slender body to trembling.

 

“Louder, Merlin!”

 

“Please, Arthur, _please_!” Merlin wailed, because the Prince had known him well enough to bring the hand forward and hold his hips.

 

He pressed deeper, and Merlin gasped with each breath.

 

“Please... _what_?” Arthur growled.

 

There was no room left for propriety in him any more. He was too full of sensation and passion.

 

“Please!” he cried at the top of his voice, desperate, wanton, submissive, and everything Arthur loved him for. “Please, Arthur, _fuck me_!”

 

“Yes,” Arthur whispered and, bringing both hands once more to the pillow either side of Merlin's shoulders, began to do just that.

 

Again, there was no mercy, and no gentleness. The Prince meant to show Merlin who was in charge. He kept his body high, using all of it to drive deep and hard into the willing body of his delightfully submissive lover.

 

“Yes,” Merlin soon encouraged, now pressing his forehead to the pillow. To Arthur's glee, it was not a soft cry – not in the least. “Arthur!”

 

“Merlin,” he hissed back, much softer.

 

Merlin had never been a silent lover, and Arthur had known it wouldn't take much pushing to bring it out of him. Sure enough, the sorcerer cried out over and over again, mostly Arthur's name, but sometimes just wordless keening and moans.

 

Arthur groaned above the sorcerer, his own control slipping from him by ever increasing degrees. Soon he was seeking his own pleasure as much as giving it, and Merlin's squirming didn't help at all. Or it helped a lot, depending on one's view.

 

“Arthur...” he whispered. “Arthur, please...”

 

“Yes,” Arthur purred and Merlin reached down to take himself in hand, which added to his own cries.

 

Of course it was he who let go first, his hips twitching and his body shuddering with his release. He cried out helplessly, and there was little doubt most, if not all, the village would know who  _really_ won.

 

Arthur followed him a few moments later, after a couple more hard thrusts and his arms shuddered with the effort of holding him up now.

 

After a short time, Merlin turned over and pulled Arthur down atop him. His long arms wound around the panting Prince and he gave a long, shaky sigh.

 

“Mmm...”

 

“Of course,” Arthur said cockily, then after a little longer; “I win.”

 

“Yes,” Merlin said softly, stroking his hair and spine. “You win. And I love you.”

 

“Mmm... and I win...” the Prince reminded him.

  
  
“Yes. And you love me.”

 

A long pause, then gently; “Yes.”


End file.
